Syllabus

Interactive Installation

Interactive installations leverage the viewer to create an experience that is more than just the sum of its components. What technologies, techniques, and fabrication skills can we leverage to achieve the “wow” factor and create enthusiasm and engagement? We will examine what sustained creative practice we can achieve by building compelling artistic content in a physical space. This class will utilize architecture and space planning, electronics, mechanical construction, cutting edge technologies and design ideals to create prototype artistic installations. Short term assignments will culminate in a large-scale final project.

Unless otherwise noted, all work should be submitted and posted online, either through the class blog or your personal website.

Evaluation Breakdown:

Teacher evaluation and class performance: 10%

Homework assignments: 30%

Midterm project: 25%

Final project: 35%

Assignments must be handed in on time. Points will be deducted for work that is handed in late. Assignments may not be accepted for grading if they are late.

Outline of Topics:

Design and Plan of Art Installation project for a specific location

Construction techniques for longer lasting projects

Design for project maintenance

Technology as an added bonus to Art Installation projects

Survey of popular technologies used in interactive art installations

Art installation as retail experience, public event, and private moment

Attendance Policy:

When students are ill, they are expected to notify professors in advance of class, if at all possible. If the instructor determines that it is an excused absence then the student should negotiate with the professor the time and place for make-up of assignments, tests and/or examinations missed. Students who are seriously ill, should contact the Office of Health and Wellness for assistance and the Assistant Dean for Academic Affairs so that the student’s professors may be contacted.

Students may present, and faculty may choose to ask for, verification of an illness but providing verification of illness does not supersede a course policy that does not allow excused absences for illness or overrule an instructor’s judgment that the illness does not meet the standards for an excused absence.

Students who, in the judgment of the instructor, have not substantially met the requirements of the course or who have been excessively absent may be considered to have withdrawn unofficially and may be given the final grade of F.

Assignment: Pick one art installation from the book or you have seen in person and respond to it on the blog. What makes the art installation “successful” in your opinion? How does it enhance (or detract) from its location? Does it deliver a message, and if it does how can we tell what the message is?

Assignment: Respond to the above media on the blog. In the same documentation post, include an updated “model” of the same room you drew for the last assignment, and include how your drawing/construction has changed (detail, scale, method of creation). Does this change your perception of your space?

Bring in 100 of something for next week.

Week 4: Module and Sum of parts

Designing and building a module, Space augmentation

Assignment: Use your 100 items to augment a space and create a feeling, document this install on your blog including photographs and peer reactions

Groups for midterm will be assigned at this time. Begin brainstorming midterm installation ideas.

Preparing backups and a repair kit, maintenance plan, schedule and techniques for long term installation

Progress report on your midterm project

Week 7: Midterm

Present your midterm installations

Write up your project on your blog, including feedback you received and possible improvements along with good photographs

Week 8: Technology – Value Added

Survey on Technologies to cover

Assignment: Pick an example of an art installation, and write how a technology component could augment and improve the installation. You may choose another project from the class as long as it is not your own.

Begin thinking about your final project.

Week 9: Physical Computing : Sensing and the Arduino

Sensor demos – touch, light, Ultrasonic/PIR sensors

Reading: Excerpt from Donald Norman’s Design of Everyday things

Week 10: User feedback and other sensor options

Kinect, USB camera

Where are people, and how much do you need to know about the location?

OpenCV

Assignment: Post to your blog with your final project ideas. Each person in the group needs to write their own blog detailing

Assignment: In process documentation of your project. What issues do you anticipate during user testing? What parts of the project are fundamental and must be completed for next week, and which parts can be finalized post testing?

Week 13: User testing

Feedback on projects in process

Assignment; Record the feedback you received, and how you will address the issues or thoughts discussed during that feedback.

Week 14: Final

Demo final projects,

Assignments: Document your work, including a write up which sets out your assumptions, the results of your project, what you would change for the next iteration, and the final feedback you received.